


You could be the one to (make me feel something)

by omgbellamy



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: 5x11, 5x12, Angst, Angst and Feels, Best Friends, Canon Compliant, Confrontations, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode: s05e11 The Dark Year, Episode: s05e12 Damocles Part 1, F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Hurt Bellamy, Hurt Clarke, Relationship Discussions, Resolved Argument Prompt Exchange, Vulnerability, belltavia sibling relationship is dicussed, mentions of becho, mentions of suicide tw, soft bellamy kinda, they discuss the radio calls properly
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-02
Updated: 2018-08-02
Packaged: 2019-06-20 21:41:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,176
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15542724
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/omgbellamy/pseuds/omgbellamy
Summary: Clarke and Bellamy finally have their conversation about everything that went on once Bellamy reaches the valley. Madi lets something interesting about Clarke slip, and Bellamy has to know why.





	You could be the one to (make me feel something)

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my 5x11-5x12 angst-filled garbage, since the show doesn't want to feed us anything relating to them at all. We deserve a conversation between these two, period, angst-filled and teary-eyed, so I thought: fuck it, I'll do it myself. Trigger warning for a mention of suicide, but it's more implied than anything. Just relating to Clarke in 5x01. Thank you guys for reading, enjoy. Will edit this garbage later and all that jazz.
> 
> Also can us bellarke hoes agree our babies deserve better than these writers? I don't trust them at all, but maybe the finale will give us some resolving with their issues.

The imprint on his cheek hurts like a bitch. He couldn’t un-see the utter look of betrayal in her eyes, her disappointment. He was breaking himself, toying with his head and his heart and trying to push his own doubts away. It had to be done, he continually reminded himself. He had to protect his family. His space crew.

But then it was true what he had said: Clarke wasn’t his family anymore. Not that he didn’t want her to be. Fuck, he wanted that more than anything. If she could’ve come with them to space and lived out those six years, he suspected this animosity between them would not exist at all. They would’ve found a way to defuse the situation like they had so many times six years prior. He believed that for sure. But now Clarke had Madi, and she would be thinking more with her own heart rather than head, and he the opposite. 

He understood her protectiveness since he grew up shielding Octavia from the world of danger and a world where her mere existence could get her killed. Madi now was in the same boat.

But he’d seen it. He’d seen her fight. Daresay she was good – better than many of the other children. But he’d guessed she had been trained beforehand to fight, or at least before Clarke, learned to live independently and survived. He hated himself for getting to that point, but he couldn’t kill his sister. Even if had poisoned her. He’d hoped and prayed she’d wake up unscathed, but able to see sense again. On the other hand, he couldn’t sit by idly and watch Wonkru start a war that ended in more bloodshed and a destroyed the only survivable valley left on Earth. 

And as she looks at him as she leaves the room, all he sees is betrayal. Just like after she’d slapped him. The look in her eyes screamed disappointment. He knows Clarke. She knows Madi is a capable fighter and she knows Madi would excel in battle, and probably even as a commander. But she’s essentially Clarke’s daughter and he knows Clarke never would’ve agreed to the flame being inside her because of it.

He sees Clarke again a week later. He’d been locked up for days like an animal until Octavia decided that she was ready for her fun. They’d gotten in the arena and fought till they were bruised and bloody, but not to the death. Octavia stopped the fight with a simple raise of her hand, and the guards took them away again. She visited him in his individual cell explaining that she was going to let Bellamy go and if he resisted or tried anything, her guards would shoot him onsite. He’d conferred with Monty over the radio, supervised by Octavia’s guards, and told him he was alive and was coming back. Bellamy just prayed that Indra was alive. She’d been cordial to him, considering their past, and she was like the mother Octavia never had. She’d shaped his sister into becoming a strong, independent person and was now trying to get her back on that track. 

Bellamy hadn’t told much of what happened. When he came stumbling into the valley, Echo ran to him, clearly bothered by the fact that he was bruised and beaten. His friends all crowded around, asking him what happened, though he’d guessed Clarke had filled them in by now.

Raven hugged him first, smiling at him. “Well, I’m glad you’re ok. We heard you were caught up in a battle; Monty said so. Thank you for trying to protect us, Bellamy.” He hugs his friend back, feeling slightly better to be with his people again. 

His friends nodded in agreement. “I wish everyone saw it that way.” He thinks of her now. She’s across camp with Kane, looking as if she’s in a heated discussion. Come to think of it, he hasn’t seen much of Madi around either.

She feels bad. She hates it, but she does. She never wanted to leave them. They were supposed to come with her and Madi to the valley – all of them. But sadly life isn’t simple for Clarke these days. Her priorities are with Madi and her safety, and not to those anymore. Besides, he had said it himself: they had two different families now, not related to each other’s. Despite the distance, Clarke does embrace them when she reaches the valley. Raven gives her an extra-long, teary-eyed hug.

“Thank you,” she whispers into Clarke’s jacket. “You saved our lives.”

“And so did you,” Clarke replies, remembering how long Raven had worked on launching the rocket to get them all to the Ring.

“We’re pretty kickass,” Raven stays instead, bumping Clarke’s shoulder with a grin once she pulls away from their hug.

Next, she embraces Murphy, who gives her a quick, tight hug and pulls away and says: “The roles are reversed now, huh?”  
She looks at him questioningly.

“Now you’re the cockroach and the mama bear, though the ‘mama’ thing has been here since we landed,” Murphy says, and Clarke manages a tight smile. He’d called her that. Mama bear.

“I guess I am.”

She makes her way through talking to everybody before deciding she needs to go talk to Madi. It feels awkward still; Clarke senses the edge even with Raven. She knows that they all know what she did. They probably know her and Bellamy aren’t speaking either. 

Clarke had left Madi with Kane to make sure she didn’t try to run again. She’d warned him about the effects of the chip; it had programmed her brain. Madi’s brain was now infused with the previous commanders and it did not sit well with Clarke. She never wanted any of this for her girl. All she wanted was her friends to return and to live in the valley with them in peace. And yet, they couldn’t even have that.

She seems him a week later. His entrance is a shock to her. Nobody stands by when he’s escorted in by some of Eligus people. She figured that he’d probably died, but she hadn’t let herself think about it. She couldn’t entertain the prospect or imagine a world where he wasn’t breathing. Because regardless of how she felt about him right now, she did not want him dead. She never could. After all they’d been through, he was still under her skin, and she couldn’t help but feeling glad he’d somehow made it out. 

In spite of her anger, Clarke finds herself letting out a sigh of relief and a quivering breath. He’s alive and he’s really here and he’s not in danger anymore. He’s free of his sister’s clutches. She just wishes she could be happy for him, that she could embrace him like she sees her friends do. They all run over once they see him, clearly greatly affected by his absence. The one she pays special note to is Echo, who runs to him, hands finding his face and eyes scanning over his body, asking multiple questions at a million miles a minute. He gives her a smile, one Clarke knows is fake and mutters what she thinks is “I’m fine”. She knows he really isn’t.

Somehow he finds her, because he always does, and he catches her eye. His expression is pained and broken, and it makes her squirm uncomfortably. She meets his eyes with a hard stare for a second, masking her disappointment and anger, before looking away dismissively. He made his choice, she has to tell herself in a mantra. He doesn’t understand her anymore and they’re better off not being associated.

But it hurts. Fuck, does it hurt. She misses him terribly. She longs for those six years to not have changed everything about them. They didn’t know each other anymore and it felt like they were living in alternate universes. Maybe it is for the better. He is greeted by all of their friends in a mass of hugs and chatter, and that’s when she realises how different things are. She’s not with them anymore. Dare Clarke say she’s been replaced by Emori and Echo and now she’s on the outside. Madi is the only one she really has. Sure, she still is close to Murphy and Raven, but even they have attachments to each other, a six-year-long bond that Clarke can’t compare with.

The rest of the day is spent catching up. By dinner, Bellamy has answered a million questions about his time in the bunker, and frankly, he just wants to sleep and wake up from this shitty dream. He’d spoken briefly with Diyoza. She’d remarked that she was surprised to see him not attached at Clarke’s hip, and he’d ignored her. He was surprised himself. Himself he would’ve thought himself after six years they’d be back on track, but apparently things just couldn’t be that easy for them. 

She’s on the end of the long wooden table in the makeshift cafeteria with Madi next to her. Madi is glancing at them all, looking a little lost and sad. Madi doesn’t have any animosity towards Bellamy; she’d told Clarke so, and she’d told him she’d embraced the flame. But it still didn’t make Clarke feel any better. If he’d had any other plan, he’d have never even entertained the idea She tries to believe it. She wants to believe that he wouldn’t hurt her and Madi if he’d had the choice, but it’s hard to trust him these days.

“You should talk to him,” Madi says, bringing Clarke away from her thoughts. Clarke whips her head around to meet the twelve-year-old’s gaze, which is focused on Bellamy way further down the table. Clarke notes he’s not eating and he’s silent among the lively chatter of other people. She eyes Raven sitting close to Shaw, the pilot, laughing loudly about something. Echo is tucked into his side, his arm thrown around her shoulder but he’s not present at all.

“There’s nothing to say,” Clarke says dismissively as she takes a bite out of the rabbit. “It’s over now.”

“It’s not over. It’s just began, Clarke. You guys have to talk about it. Bellamy was only trying to protect his people, to protect y-”

Clarke holds up a hand to silence her. She can’t have this conversation now. She’s too mentally drained to think about the why of it all. With Wonkru due to arrive any day now, they have to focus on getting everybody prepared.

“Enough, Madi.”

“No!” Madi exclaims, slamming her plate onto the table. The noise is loud enough to attract the attention of other nearby people, including from down the end of the table. “You tell me when you choose to stop denying the truth and being a coward, Clarke,” she says, quieter, with a pointed gaze toward Bellamy. Clarke notices from the corner of her eye that he’s paying attention to the spectacle. Fucking Great. With that, Madi gets up from the table and storms off. 

“Madi, come back here! Madi!” 

The girl doesn’t respond, and Clarke lets out a heavy sigh, going after her. 

“Madi!” Clarke breaks into a jog across Eden, past the church and down to their little house. She finds Madi in there on her bed, drawings of her friends scattered amongst her.  
“This is what matters,” Madi says, knowing Clarke is there before she even enters the bedroom. She gestures to the sketches. “Family. Your friends. Bellamy. You need to speak to him, Clarke. You made a mistake back there, you know so. I get it you were trying to protect me, but I don’t need protecting anymore. The flame…it’s powerful. Strong. And so am I now. Bellamy was only was doing what he thought was right, making the only choice. He never forced me, Clarke; he and Gaia gave me the choice. He did it to save you and your friends, but I chose to accept the flame. You know why? Because I’m tired of running. I’m tired of pretending to be just a girl when I’ve always know who I am: I am a natblida, and now I am a commander. If that means I can stop the war and protect you, then I don’t care what the sacrifices are.”

“Madi,” Clarke says, voice hoarse, voice tired from all the arguing and back and forth, between all of the strategizing sessions and avoiding her feelings. “You’re just a child. There’s no reason you need to take on that responsibility. I don’t want that life for you, that burden for you. It’s not just a case of you being strong, which I know you are, it’s your livelihood and yourself that are at risk. The expectations of a commander are too high for any child, and Bellamy knew that. He broke a promise to me, a promise to protect you, even if his intentions were good. He hurt you and me. He betrayed me.”

“But he did it for you, Clarke,” Madi says, frustrated. She holds up two sketches of Bellamy, one a close up of his freckled face and another of a side profile of his bright smile. “He would do it all for you, I know that. Just like you called him for 2,199 days because you-”

Clarke can’t hear the words fall from her lips. She can’t deny it to Madi’s face. Because she knows. Clarke knows, too. She’s known it for a while. Having those six years away from her friends gave her a lot of time to reflect. She realised it: her and Bellamy were always a little more than friends. It was the unspoken that confirmed it to her, that there was always something more there but they never acknowledged it. There was always a war to fight, people to save or a new threat to eliminate, and they had no time. Clarke envied her friends for that. She’d seen romances blossom among them with Harper and Monty, Murphy and Emori and Raven and Zeke. But for six years she had lived in almost isolation without any other adults around. She loves Madi with her whole heart, but sometimes she longed to speak to someone her own age. It was partly why she’d started the radio calls out of desperate loneliness but a need for human connection – one particular human connection.

“Madi,” Clarke says firmly. 

“Clarke,” Madi repeats, folding her arms.

Clarke releases a heavy sigh. “Go to sleep, Madi.”

Clarke blows out the candle in their cabin, and Madi begrudgingly goes to her bed.

Madi doesn’t sleep that night. She hears the lull of footsteps outside and muted conversations of people around the village. It’s the thoughts racing in her head and the whispers of previous commanders that keep her awake. The inevitability of the war is looming over her, and she knows she can’t run anymore, even if Clarke thinks she will. They’re on the wrong side, aligned with a bad man, and Madi knows that. Being the young girl that she is, she disobeys Clarke’s command and leaves her bed.

She wanders down the path closer to the mess hall where she knows the cabins of spacekru are. She knows which cabin is Bellamy’s because she’d seen him retire there the past two nights. Madi doesn’t bother knocking like she knows she should, she just pushes the door open quietly. 

She finds him sitting there at the makeshift desk, looking over what seems to be plans.

“Madi,” Bellamy greets her, surprised. She doesn’t miss the way he covers the paper and pushes it out of sight. “Shouldn’t you be in bed? Clarke will kill you.”

Madi smiles amusedly at that. Clarke was never particular strict about bedtimes with Madi, partly because she knew Madi could sleep at any time whenever usually, having spent months living in the woods in Eden by herself.

“She doesn’t know I’m here,” The girl says.

Bellamy’s brows furrow together. He doesn’t want to cross a line. He’s already on very thin ice with Clarke concerning Madi. Well, he’s pretty much fallen through the fucking ice by now. 

“You should get back before she finds you gone.”

“She’s fast asleep; she’ll never know.”

“Madi—”

“You have to talk to her, Bellamy.”

Bellamy shakes his head. “Clarke doesn’t want anything to do with me, Madi.”

“That’s not true,” Madi persists, “She’s just angry, like you are. You both made decisions that you thought were right. I told her you didn’t force me to take the flame. You two have to talk. You have to know…” Madi trails off, not knowing if she should tell him.

Bellamy senses something change in her demeanour. She came in as always with a confident persona, headstrong like her mother. She reminded him of the Clarke he first knew back at the Dropship, the stubborn eighteen-year-old who challenged him and surprised him. 

“Know what?” Bellamy prompts.

Madi sighs. She knows Clarke. With the flame, she’d seen it. Clarke had loved and lost before, been upset too many times to count. Madi, though young, could see Clarke and Bellamy were supposed to be on the same side. They were supposed to be together, around each other. She couldn’t let them destroy it anymore, not over her, or Octavia or the stupid war.

“She called you,” Madi says. “She called you every day for six years on the radio. At first, I thought she was trying to contact all of you guys, but she would mostly talk to you.”

Bellamy’s breath hitches. He can’t believe what he’s hearing. She talked to him? Talked to him? Everyday. For. Six. Years. He couldn’t comprehend it. Dammit! If only they’d got the comms working like they tried. Raven had tried multiple times to rewire the communications system to try and reach the bunker and the whole time his sister was alive in the bunker and Clarke was speaking to him every day alone on the ground.

He remembers then. He remembers how closed-off she was when he’d asked her how she survived. He hadn’t meant to touch on a sore subject, but he was dying to know. They had barely talked since he’d come back to Earth, and now he knew why. They’d both fucked up and fucked each over. Their relationship was twisted at this point, nowhere like it was before. The admission from Madi gave Bellamy the urge to run to her tent and just wrap her up in his arms and apologise. But realistically, he knew it was never like that for them. It never could be.

They needed to have their highly anticipated talk. Because try as he might, Bellamy was still hurt. She had left him to die, and he’d betrayed her trust by going behind her back. But Bellamy figured this was just how they worked now. They’d disagreed before and made questionable decisions to protect each other and the people they loved and this time was no different in that sense. But this time it had been made personal, because Madi was involved. 

“She didn’t stop thinking about you or caring, and it’s the same now,” Madi continues. “Everybody needs you to work together to win this war. Like you did at the Dropship.”

Bellamy looks at her questioningly. 

“Clarke told me how you worked together,” Madi clarifies with a small smile. “She told me stories about all of you and the Grounders. Plus, I know a lot of things thanks to the flame. But she spoke about you the most, and I think that means something."

Bellamy blinks back at her. “Madi…"

Madi turns toward the door. “Just talk to her please.”

“I’ll try.”

Madi gives him a nod in response, and turns to leave. Just before she slips out the now opened door, she turns back around. “Bellamy?”

Bellamy turns also. “Yeah?”

“I was wrong before: she has to forgive you, and so do you. And I forgive you too, okay?”

This time Bellamy doesn’t argue, although he doesn’t share the young girl’s optimism. “Okay.”

“Goodnight.” 

With that she leaves and heads back to their cabin. She prays Clarke hasn’t woke from her absence. 

Bellamy doesn’t know how to feel the next morning. His mind is reeling still from what Madi had told him. It doesn’t make sense to him. She had called them – him specifically – every day for six years. Without fail. And he hadn’t even heard. He slams his fist down on the table. Fuck. Why couldn’t she have told him? Why didn’t he know sooner? That conversation by the campfire…he felt she was pulling away from him. And now he knows why. She didn’t intend to tell him or for him to find out at all.

Amidst everything going on, that thought makes him angry. It shouldn’t be Madi being the one to tell him, it should’ve been her. They should’ve said everything they needed the second they were in the prison cell and not held back. Yet Clarke had purposely kept the secret from him as if it was something private as if it didn’t directly involve him.

He’s also angry because it stirs up uncomfortable feelings within him that he thought he buried six years ago. Now it’s much more complicated because a part of him is still mad at her for leaving him, yet he understands and he’s more hurt than anything. But then there’s another part of him who is also angry because she wasn’t thinking about the bigger picture and the safety of them all, but also he’s angry because even after all of this, he and Clarke don’t know where they stand anymore.

And then there’s the fact he still has Echo…And then he feels guilty for what he did to Madi, to Clarke and guilty because he doesn’t know what all these new feelings mean concerning Echo.

Not being able to take it, Bellamy marches off in the direction of Clarke’s cabin, determined to bury the hatchet. It’s just after sunrise, so he figures she’ll just be waking up now since he’s noticed she’s a much earlier riser than she used to be.

He knocks gently on the door despite himself, and a tired Clarke comes to the door. Immediately she assumes a protective stance, eyeing Madi over her shoulder. 

“What do you need?” she says curtly. He’s the last person she wants to see this early in the morning or at all right now.

“I need to talk to you,” he says simply. He’s not giving much away either, remaining far too neutral for Clarke’s liking.

“So talk,” she says evenly.

The lack of emotion in her voice makes Bellamy even angrier. He gives her a frown. “Alone, Clarke.”

Clarke scoffs. “You think I’m letting Madi out of my sight now? After the bunker?”

Bellamy winces at that. He does feel bad honestly. But it was an impossible situation; and it had to be done.

“Clarke. I’m fine. Bellamy probably needs you something for much more important, anyway. I’m going to go bother Raven; I’m sure she needs help with something.”

“Madi.” She stares the child down, but Madi doesn't budge.

Madi gives Clarke a breezy smile. “I’ll radio you, if it helps.” 

Clarke deliberates for a second before she reluctantly nods. “Fine. But you better be back in an hour for breakfast, ok?”

“I got it! See you!” The young girl runs happily off down the path, heading in the direction of where all of their equipment and weapons are stored.

Clarke wordlessly leads Bellamy inside. She suddenly feels self-conscious. It’s stupid. He is – was – her best friend. She shouldn’t feel bad about the appearance of her home, but somehow she does. She can see him eyeing the room, drinking in the animal furs on either bed, the candle by Clarke’s nightstand and the desk, littered with papers and chalk and what looks like plans for battle. Thank god her sketchbook was tucked away under the bed.

Clarke turns back around then arms folded. “So, what is it you want to talk to me about?”

“A lot of things,” Bellamy blurts, and Clarke raises an eyebrow.

“Let’s start with the fact that I am sorry. I am. I know you don’t believe me, but it’s true. It was an impossible choice that I made for the good of you and our people. I didn’t want to do it, but it was the last resort to saving them.”

“No,” Clarke corrects, “You did it to save your people, not mine. Madi is my people, and you made it perfectly clear we don’t fit into your bracket of people anyway.”

Bellamy guesses he deserves that. He’d basically told her she wasn’t his family, but he had meant it in a different way. He couldn’t express how much she meant to him, how he did in fact care for her and Madi greatly but they were in the firing line of conflict, and were collateral damage more than anything else.

“I didn’t mean it like that. You are my people, Clarke. You always have been even if you don’t believe it now. That extends to Madi, too. I want us to work together and have peace. We all do.”

“But you don’t mind sacrificing the innocent mind of a child to get it, do you?” Clarke snaps.

That flares Bellamy’s temper. Please, he thinks, as if she wouldn’t do the exact same thing if it was any other child. “You know if that wasn’t Madi we’d be in agreement,” Bellamy comments.   
Clarke says nothing to rebuttal him, and Bellamy figures he’s right about that.   
"But the fact is, it was Madi," she reminds him. "And you endangered her, breaking the promise you made to protect her, and my trust."

“I’m sorry for breaking your trust, I really am. But believe it or not Clarke, the flame is protecting Madi, too. You may think she can’t handle that, or that she she’s too young, but she’s been trained for this her whole life. I don’t like it, but its what we have now. Octavia won’t surrender, not at least until every last member of Wonkru has given up on her.”

“Madi said the same thing to me,” Clarke mutters, clearly annoyed. She doesn’t look at him now. She’s still angry and hurt by him. He left her in chains, left there once again because he didn’t want to do things her way.

“Said what to you?”

“She said you never forced it on her. She was the one who told me to go back for you.”

“Oh,” Bellamy says, because really, what can he say to that? There’s already salt in the wound surrounding the fact she had left him, hearing it from her mouth made it hurt more. He knew Madi cared about him, as he did her, but he didn’t think she’d want to risk Clarke’s safety for his own.

“I couldn’t. I’m sorry I left – I shouldn’t have. I was just angry at you and hurt and I was only thinking about Madi, and I just…” She trails off, letting out an apologetic sigh. Her eyes search his, and he sees no anger there in her eyes just regret and hurt.

Bellamy echoes her sigh. “I get it. I was mad too, because at first I was like, ‘I’m gonna die, and she doesn’t care’, but then I realised after how I’d treated you, it wasn’t the most uncharacteristic thing in the world. I’m still upset – but yeah, leaving you there chained up was a pretty dick move on my part.”

Clarke doesn’t crack a smile, but he thinks he sees a hint of dark amusement in her bright blue eyes. “Yeah, it was,” she agrees. “But I hurt you, too. In both ways. I’m sorry for that.” Her voices changes suddenly as she has a change in thought, showcasing discomfort. “Echo told me the same thing – about leaving you, I mean.”

He blinks, a slight crease forming between his brows. Of all the people, Echo was the last person he had expected her to converse with. “What?”

“She said I’d betrayed you and that I didn’t care if you lived or that you died. I told her that I always cared, because I did and I do.”

He doesn’t laugh because he doesn’t think the situation warrants it, but he figures they’re ok now. But then he remembers what Madi had told him, and suddenly he feels like he is about to drop a bombshell.

“You do?” he asks, because he has to.

Clarke wants to roll her eyes, but she knows its inappropriate given the serious nature of the conversation. 

“Of course,” she says quietly, sincerity surrounding her voice. She looks at him now and really looks at him for the first time since she’d slapped him. “I never stopped caring.” Madi had told him that, too.

Bellamy softens then, his heart thumping rapidly. Little did Clarke know the affect her words had always had on him. That was no different six years later.  
I need you.  
I trust you.  
I forgive you.

Each time his heart felt like it was going to give out, and he figured that was always how it would be with her.

“Me either,” he admits. “I know you think…I know you think I don’t care, but fuck, I do. I never stopped with you.” His voice breaks, because suddenly, six years of guilt and mourning are flushed out into the open, and all of the suppression and careful balance of emotion he had been maintaining since the Ring bursts open like a dam. 

“I mourned you for six years. Six years I just thought you died and sacrificed yourself for us, because, you fucking would. I picked myself up because ‘Clarke would want us to’, as Raven said, and I got busy. I trained, I helped in the algae farm, I did maintenance on the ship. I did whatever I could to make sure it was all okay for you. I used my head for you and Octavia, but mainly because of you.”

Clarke doesn’t interrupt. Her fists are clenched by her sides and she’s willing tears not to spill out of her own eyes. It’s too soon to be so raw to be so exposed with him. They need to get whatever it is that they are back on track first before they get into the nitty-gritty of it all.

“But…also, I moved on. Or, I tried to. Well, I guess you figured that out by now.” He flashes a wry smile, but Clarke tenses. She doesn’t want to hear about how he found Echo. She’s happy that he’s happy and they seem good for each other, at least.

She was…she was lonely, too. We were both suffering from being away and in the end, it just kind of happened. It took three long years and we became friends and then by the fifth year, it was something more, something I still can’t explain or fathom to this day, but…” He pauses, looking to her to gauge her reaction. Clarke looks on the verge of something, of what, he isn’t sure.

“I didn’t forget about you. You were always in the forefront of my mind, even when I actively denied you were dead, I had to face the reality that you weren’t there with us even if you were supposed to be. And I made peace with that, until I came back down here.”

He takes a deep breath.

“I saw you and everything changed. You were alive, and you had a kid, but it was still you. And now I feel like I don’t know you or us anymore, well, until Madi told me about the radio calls.”

That seems to wake Clarke up. She freezes, her eyes wide, and her heart beginning to pound like an aggressive drum. Fuck. He knows. He was never supposed to know. It clearly did not work for a reason, and now she has to talk about it.

“What do you know?” is what she says instead, keeping her voice neutral.

“Not much. Madi just told me you radioed me specifically every day for six years. I mean…why, Clarke? Why for so long and why me?”

Clarke resists the urge to scoff. Why him? She could think of a million reasons. He’s always been her person even after everything they’d been through together and put each other through. Because at the end of it all, he’s the only one who can truly know her better than she knows herself and he’s the only one excluding Madi, who can understand her burdens. Madi knows because of the flame, but Bellamy had been through it with her and experienced it. 

“It doesn’t matter,” she says dismissively. Now isn't the time, she wants to scream, but her mouth won't let the words escape.

Bellamy starts towards her to touch her arm, but she inches further away inside the cabin. Bellamy pretends not to flinch, but it does hurt that she doesn’t want to be near him.

“Clarke,” he says, voice careful. “Please.”

Clarke wants to yell at him for bringing up something so big, and with the worst timing in history. Why did Madi tell him? Why is he bringing it up now? Fuck it, they’re on the brink of war and he thinks now is a good time to talk about this?!

She takes a minute to think. Telling him is not helpful, but maybe it’ll help them get back on track, after all, they have to work together to win this war and keep Wonkru away from the valley. 

She slumps down on the stool behind her feet, and decides she’s too defeated to think about the consequences. “Because I needed you,” she says simply. “I was fucking lonely and a mess when you guys left. I figured if I could reach you on the radio through the communications system – all of you – that you’d know I was alive and you could update me and I could update you, and things would be better.”

Bellamy looks at her, sad. 

Clarke doesn’t look at him for long. “But for a while after no responses back, I figured maybe you guys hadn’t made it, but then I realised Raven Reyes is a fucking genius and that was unlikely.” 

Bellamy’s mouth quirks up at that because yeah; Raven Reyes is a prodigy. 

“I told you I had Madi, but I had you too. You specifically helped me through some of the hardest times, Bellamy. Maybe it’s stupid that I was talking to myself on the radio, but it kept me helpful. Particularly in those first two months before I found Madi, I…” Clarke hesitates, running a hand across her short hair. 

She looks him directly in the eyes now. “I reached a breaking point. There was hardly any food to eat and the radiation was still present outside then. It burned whenever I went outside or stepped out of the rover. I went foraging and turned up nothing and then I thought about ending it all.”

Bellamy inhales sharply. She was going to…end her own life? She had it so hard down here while they were living what was a cushy life in space. Sure, they'd eaten shitty-tasting algae for six years, but at least they were together. Clarke was alone on a deserted planet only with a child for company.

“Clarke…”

“Don’t,” she cuts in. “Don’t.” Tears gather at the corners of her eyes, but she pushes them away determinedly. “I got through it. Things got better when I found Eden, and I had hope again. I finally had someone else by my side with Madi and then I just waited it out. I waited for those six years, for those 2,199 days for you to come down. And when you did, everything got worse.”

Bellamy blinks at her. He doesn’t like her statement, but it is pretty much true. They’d been the ones to open the bunker, and in doing so they’d unleashed a monster out of its cage. Maybe if they hadn’t, they would’ve lived in peace. But Bellamy could never not know. His sister would’ve died eventually if she had been left there. They all would’ve. And she was his sister, so his responsibility. At least she used to be.

“Everything’s a clusterfuck now, that’s for sure,” Bellamy states, and Clarke huffs a bitter laugh.  
“Yeah. It is.”

“And us…where do we stand?” he asks. 

She tilts her head. Usually she and Bellamy were secure of their relationship. In the six years she’d known him, he’d never had to question her on that. Their connection was unspoken. They had once been in sync and silent understanding, but now it felt as the bond they forged as best friends with co-leaders had been broken down and replaced in their new retrospective groups. 

“I don’t know, Bellamy.”

Bellamy rubs a stressed hand over his face. “I don’t either.”

“All I know,” Clarke begins, crossing her legs on the chair. “Is that we have a war coming up, and we can’t continue like this.” She hesitates then. “I know that I need you and Madi needs you, so we need to somehow move past this.”

Bellamy smiles genuinely for the first time in a while. Even when he’d returned, his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes, and he could see they knew that. But now it feels raw and real, how it always was with Clarke. “I agree.”

Clarke smiles reluctantly at him. She’s not crying anymore, but the tears are still fresh on her face. “I’m glad. I’m sorry, again. I shouldn’t have left you-”  
Boldly, Bellamy shushes her and strides right up in front of her. Clarke gulps. She hasn’t been this close to him since their hug in the prison cell, and she doesn’t like to think too deeply into it.

That hug, she realises, confirmed things for her. She’s had these…feelings for him, and since she’d seen him again they seemed to intensify. Having six years to reflect and think over everything helped her to compartmentalise those feelings. She’d pushed them away before. They’d had Alie to deal with and then Praimfaya and then…  
Then he was gone. She was on a dying planet.

Clarke doesn’t know how to love anyone but Madi now. Love outside of familial love is a foreign concept to her these days. Love isn’t weakness, but love is pain. She’d seen it happen to herself with Finn and then Lexa and with Octavia and Lincoln, and that had ended in tragedy. She and Bellamy were magnets for it themselves and if he died at her hand she couldn’t take it. She’d lost too much and he was not expendable, even if he believed himself to be.

“Let’s just not talk for a while. That okay?” The tenderness in his quiet voice makes her stomach flip and her race just a little. 

Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. She nods in response.

Bellamy reaches down toward her hand which is slightly bruised and scratched from when she had to fend off McCreary. He swipes his hand across the front of her hand towards her knuckles and back again. She closes her eyes involuntarily, feeling content for the first time in what feels like days. 

“We’ll get through this,” he promises. “I’ll protect you and Madi and our friends, okay? Nothing will happen to Madi and if she has to go into the battle, we’ll be by her side every step of the way.”

Clarke opens her eyes then, a thought occurring to her. “But Octavia won’t like that,” Clarke protests. “You can’t be out there, not with Madi against Octavia.”

“I don’t care anymore. I can’t change her. I’ve accepted Octavia doesn’t like a lot of things,” Bellamy murmurs more to himself than to her. “But she may finally see sense. Wonkru’s cracks are already showing; her people are leaning toward a commander. When we were in the pit, Monty interrupted the fight. The algae farmer in the bunker was thriving, thanks to Monty’s green thumb. We could see people were torn between the idea of a life in the bunker with a stable farm for food rather than an uncertain outcome in a war that would inevitably cause bloodshed. Her people aren’t loyal to her, not like they used to be.”

Clarke still looks unsure. “If she finds out you’re taking Madi’s side, she’ll kill you.”

Bellamy shakes his head. “If she wanted to, she would’ve done when I was locked up, or after I’d poisoned her. She never did. I know my sister. Maybe the shrivel of humanity she has left is reserved for me and Indra, because I could see she was upset when she was watching us in the pit, even if her Blodreina façade showed nothing.”

Clarke shrugs. She doesn’t like the idea of Madi having a face-off with Octavia, but maybe Bellamy is right. Even Clarke thought Octavia’s ruthless leadership would not work after the war. What if Wonkru won the war, what then? They’d no longer need Octavia since the valley itself had plenty of food and room to build. Wonkru had many builders, fighters and foragers within their community so Octavia would be rendered useless to them after that.

“I’m still not convinced.” Clarke is still as stubborn as ever, he thinks fondly. At least that hasn't changed.

Bellamy squeezes Clarke’s hand, jolting her out of her thoughts. “Hey. I meant what I said before okay: we’re doing this together. The heart and the head. I don’t care about the risks. We’ve been apart on opposite sides since we landed, and I’m done with that. I don’t want to be arguing with you anymore, and I don’t want us to be living separate lives. You’re a part of my family, Clarke, and we protect our family, ok?”

Clarke’s stomach flutters. She’d seen Bellamy passionate a few times before mostly when he was giving a speech to the 100 about building the camp, having free rights and about their first war with the Grounders, but directed towards her was something new. He’d been angry on her behalf before like when Echo had threatened her in Polis. He looked livid. Maybe she was looking too deeply into it, but it felt like he was ready to cut her head off. Now wasn't the time to think about it.

And now they’re dating, her subconscious snarks. 

Clarke frowns in spite of herself. Stupid subconscious can fuck off. She reminds herself that lots of things are different now, but right in this moment, it almost feels like six years ago when Bellamy and her were side by side, how it was destined to be. 

She smiles back at him then, light blue eyes meeting dark brown. “Okay,” she relents. “Together.”

“Together,” he echoes.

And this time, he means it.


End file.
